Object or Lens flare?

A friend of mine took this picture. He is convinced it is not a lens flare. I am not that good at manipulating photos. I looked at it with several
things adjusted and embossed etc etc but I still cant determine if it is a solid object or lens flare. The sun is directly above it but the object
seems to be actually behind the grass.

And I see what you are talking about, but.
I still think its your typical green lens flare from the sun.

Here in the adjusted pic it looks pretty cool. It looks like a solid object. Also it looks like it is affecting the area around it. Like the fake
videos of UFO's creating crop circles (not saying you photo shopped at all it just reminded me of those). I have no idea what it could be. I am
going to say no lens f

The sun is directly above it but the object seems to be actually behind the grass.

In this case the sun is striking the camera lens, refracting thru that and striking the camera imager chip. The imager records the scenery as well as
the little green spot refracting thru the lens itself.

Cool pic! So the EXIF data checks out, helping ruling out any photoshop manipulation. Battery operated spherical lights aren't unheard of, and
certainly one way of achieving this photo. I can also see how it might be seen as a reflection of the sun or such, but a couple of other things are
cool and give it a "physical object" vibe.

Firstly the depth of the aura, seem like it's actually part of the area and not a burn/reflection mark by the camera. The top left of the aura seems
to naturally fall on the plants, gives it a 3D ring vibe...

Note: My experience tells me we should see a corresponding sun spot (where the sun actually is) but it's all one brightness in the sky. Whatever is
blocking out the bottom of the object in ground if, it were a reflection, should also be seen in that black mass, but it isn't. Would need to run some
tests for myself to be sure about this...

I sort of agree with the "behind the grass" comment, but with this filter it seems more like it's buried in the ground. The outline of the aura in
this one seems a bit odd for a reflection o fthe sun, it's seems a bit non-uniform. Yet when you look at the filtered pic above, it seems to form an
almost perfect 3D tilted circle. Make of this what you will

The final slightly perplexing thing is the "mist" or shape below, which seems to form a sort of "neon light" Question Mark symbol ( ? ) again in an
almost perfect fashion. I have no idea how you'd get that on there. Cool co-incidence or clever trickery? I dunno... Possibly a secondary reflection
of the main object, but its angle seems to be 15 degrees or so to the opposite direction of the other.

Note: This image helps you see the taller plants dotted nearby, and the object at grass/ground level, and it does look like a piece of ground level
grass/tuft is overlapping the bottom.

Flagged though cos it's a cool image, good thread...and I'm "into" balls of light in fields at the moment, so relevant personally, thank you!

Thank you for that analysis. That's exactly the kind of insight I'm looking for. The man who owns this property and took the picture has 300 acres
or so and nothing is beyond that picture for at least it 20 miles. He has a clear view of the field from his window and all he usually sees there is
deer.

originally posted by: kurthall
It looks like a solid object. Also it looks like it is affecting the area around it.

Well, maybe it's a solid object like a ball or something that just happens to be sitting right where a lens flare happens to be showing up. I did a
color range check and the object is the only thing with that color to be found in the entire photo.

originally posted by: Tybrus
I looked at it with several things adjusted and embossed etc etc but I still cant determine if it is a solid object or lens flare.

That's natural, looking at a photo we can only see how light was captured by the camera, either reflected or emitted, so it's not really possible to
say if we are looking at a light in front of something or if we are looking at a translucent (or opaque) object.

In this case our brains see what looks like a sphere with a piece missing, so it assumes it's hidden behind the grass, but a lens flare (and I do
think this is a lens flare) can look exactly like that. If part of the sun was covered by a cloud, the reflection of the sun inside the lens or on the
sensor surface would be a perfect reproduction of that, so the lens flare would look the same, with part hidden.

I saw a photo that was a great example of that some time ago, I'll see if I can find it.

Not really, It was very light in here when I first looked, and it does look toward green now when this room is in darkness, and I didn't look at the
image in the ATS file, which is most always much better.
Very often there are blue dots appear like this, especially on mobile phones, as digital cameras need to the avoid infra red light, or at least they
are designed to do that, complicated formulated stuff miles long I couldn't begin to go with, but it will be out there somewhere if you have a month
or two to spare.

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